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Turkey Presses EU At Summit To Curb Migrant Flow

March 07, 2016
by RFE/RL

Turkey is pressing EU leaders for a number of concessions, including a doubling of funding from the bloc, in exchange for deeper cooperation to curb the flow of migrants to Europe, according to diplomats being quoted as intense negotiations continue in Brussels.

Representatives from the European Union are trying to hammer out a deal with Ankara to ensure the large-scale and fast-track return to Turkey of migrants who have fled their countries for economic reasons rather than to escape the direct effects of war in places like Syria.

Details of the talks between leaders of the 28 EU states and Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu remain scarce amid reports of tough bargaining as the summit runs into overtime.

It's the latest diplomatic push to establish control as Europe faces its biggest inflow of migrants since World War II, with the strains threatening to divide EU members and reverse decades of work to establish the border-free Schengen zone.

News agencies have quoted diplomats as saying privately that Turkey has raised its price for cooperation with the EU beyond earlier demands, yet also has offered to do more to curb the flow of refugees than it had offered previously.

Diplomatic sources said the Turkish side was requesting a doubling of the EU's offer in November to provide 3 billion euros ($3.3 billion) to help Ankara care for Syrian refugees in Turkey.

Other reports suggested Ankara was also pushing for faster movement in negotiations on Turkey's eventual membership in the EU, as well as to ease EU visa rules for Turkish citizens.

Davutoglu said ahead of the summit that he hoped it would 'not just focus on irregular migration but also on the Turkish accession process to the EU.'

He also said he hoped for a 'turning point' at the summit, adding that Turkey was indispensable for the EU, just as Europe was for Turkey.

A purported draft of an agreement was said to call temporarily for the speedy readmission to Turkey of 'all irregular migrants' crossing into the Greek islands and more Turkish staff to help achieve that goal, as well as increased cooperation by Turkey with the EU and UN refugee agency, the UNHCR, to resettle Syrians on a burden-sharing basis through a formula of 'for every Syrian readmitted by Turkey from Greek islands, another Syrian will be resettled from Turkey to the EU member states.'

Turkey has long sought EU membership, but the accession process has been slowed by European concerns over human rights issues in Turkey, including treatment of minorities and press freedom, among other issues.

The atmosphere of the EU-Turkey meeting was partly clouded hours ahead of the March 7 meeting as EU officials expressed dismay over Ankara's seizing control of Turkey's best-selling newspaper, Zaman.

Authorities took control of the paper on March 4 at the request of an Istanbul prosecutor, reportedly over allegations the paper has links to U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, a strong critic of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Ankara has frequently accused Gulen's followers in Turkey of seeking to topple the state, a claim Gulen's supporters deny.

European Parliament chief Martin Schulz said immediately after meeting with Davutoglu that the seizure of critical newspapers runs contrary to the values of the bloc Turkey seeks to join. 'Freedom is a non-negotiable element of European identity,' Schulz said.

EU leaders were also expected to discuss on March 7 whether to declare the Balkan route closed after Austria and four Balkan countries unilaterally decided to limit the number of border crossings to a trickle late last month.

European Council President Donald Tusk, who is chairing the summit, has reportedly proposed that the EU approve a draft statement saying that 'irregular flows of migrants along the Western Balkans route are coming to an end; this route is now closed.'

But diplomats say privately that German Chancellor Angela Merkel is resisting the push to endorse the border closures.

Backed by EU member states Austria, Croatia, Slovenia, and Hungary, non-EU member Macedonia is currently limiting the number of refugees it will allow to cross its border from Greece to 300 a day.

In choosing who will enter, Skopje has barred anyone from areas in Iraq and Syria it does not consider to be active conflict zones and stopped admitting Afghans and other nationalities altogether.

Brussels has opposed such moves in the absence of a broader consensus.

The states along the Balkan route began choking off entries after Vienna said it would accept no more than 80 asylum seekers daily, raising fears they would see thousands of migrants stranded on their territory. Vienna also said it would allow no more than 3,200 people to transit Austria daily.

The EU estimates that between 2,000 and 3,000 people continue to arrive in Greece from Turkey each day, raising the risk that thousands of new migrants will back up in Greece now that the Balkan route has shrunk.

Greece, whose economy is struggling amid a continuing debt crisis, already has a back-up of some 30,000 migrants and is among the EU's worst-equipped states for dealing with the influx.

The March 7 summit is expected to assure Athens that the European Union will help with housing the migrants now stranded in Greece.

But it remains uncertain whether the EU states will be able to agree on Athens' demand that the bloc speed up the relocation of registered asylum seekers from Greece to other counties.

Efforts to agree late last year on mandatory redistribution quotas for EU states foundered on opposition from several Eastern and Central European members.

Ahead of the summit, NATO announced it was expanding its naval mission against people-smuggling in the Aegean Sea by deploying warships in Greek and Turkish waters, reinforcing its flotilla, and deepening cooperation with the EU's Frontex border agency.

But efforts to prevent the sea crossings are hampered by Turkey's long coastline, which offers many possibilities for clandestine people-smuggling.

The Balkan route has become the main entry point for migrants to Europe since last year, with 880,000 people using it in 2015 alone.

The numbers have increased this year, with almost 132,000 crossing from Turkey to Greece in the first two months of this year, nearly as many as in the entire first half of 2015.

More than 400 migrants have died or disappeared while attempting to reach Greece from Turkey aboard unseaworthy boats since the beginning of 2016. On March 6, a boat capsized off the Turkish coast with the loss of 25 lives.

With reporting by AP, AFP, and Reuters

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/eu-turkish-leaders- gather-in-brussels-for-migrant-summit/27593151.html

Copyright (c) 2016. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.